Again, not exactly breaking news… I’m still waiting for Michael Vick to sign so I can finally dust off my notebook full of dog abuse jokes. Which is sitting right next to my Nazi Pun’s notebook, if you were wondering. Did Nazi that coming. This post is now outside Mein Kampfort zone. That’s just a taste. I have plenty more to commit complete and total SEO suicide, just you wait and see.

Anyhow, guess what? The Denver Broncos have double-downed (POKER AND FOOTBALL DOUBLE PUN ALERT) on Montee Ball and C.J. Anderson, allowing Knowshon Moreno to become a free agent. What say you Knowshon Moreno?

If that was what he did during the National Anthem, you gotta wonder what the hell he did on 9/11…

So, looks like second-year backs Montee Ball and C.J. Anderson will have to try and replace more than 1,000 yards of rushing, 500 yards receiving and 13 touchdowns. That’s, of course, not including the ‘always trying to reestablish himself’ Ronnie Hillman and probably some kind of veteran back brought in to ‘push’ the stable of young guys. HAHA, stable, get it? THEY’RE ALL PONIES. My interest could be piqued if that ‘veteran back’ is Darren McFadden or Maurice Jones-Drew. Maybe even Donald Brown. But seeing as how those are probably backs seeking starting duties, I’m not going to hold my breath.

Where does that leave us? Is Montee Ball ready to replace Knowshon Moreno? (More like Montee “Can’t hold on to the” Ball, amiright folks?) Interestingly enough, the transition was slowly starting in Denver’s last eight games (including the play-offs). Ball averaged 6.6 carries over his first 11 games and 9.1 over the final eight. Selected out of Wisconsin in the second round of the 2013 draft, he rushed for 559 yards on 4.7 yards per carry as a rookie. In week 13 against the Kansas City Chiefs, he ran for 117 yards and ended the regular season by rushing more than 70 yards twice. Even in a Peyton Manning-passing dominated offense, there’s still plenty of opportunity around the line of scrimmage, and you’d have to think Denver will try to commit to their running game as much as possible.

It’ll be interesting to see if the Broncos are committed to Ball as the primary back and how he responds as the off-season progresses into training camp. I’m not quite sure where I would have him ranked at this point, as a lot of things can change until the 2014 season… but you have to like the situation and potential as of this moment.

As for Moreno’s future, the obvious choice is for him to get signed by the Browns so he can take his fountain of tears to the Factory of Sadness. It’s what the corporate people call ‘synergistic integration’…

Even with almost 2 less carries per contest and a game(week 15) when he only got 3 carries for -1 yard. we see that Ball still out gained Moreno by over 16 yards & 3 more YAC per game!

From week 1-10(9 games), Ball had a grand total of 2 catches for 27 yards. From week 11-17(7games), he had 2.6 catches for 16.9 yards per game. You fully expand those #s over a full 16 games and you get 41.6 catches & 270.4 yards. No reason to think both #s will not be more with Moreno(3.8 catches, 34.25 yards & .19 TDs) out of the picture.

The last item is going to be focused around the fumbling of the football. By the end of week 3, he(Ball) had already fumbled 2 times. From week 4-17(13 games), he had only fumbled 1 time. Also that fumble did not occur after week13. That is when we started to see him out produce Knowshon Moreno.

If the starting gig is for Montee to run with then he is going to be a very high demand player come draft day. Which I would not have an issue with as his #s could be very close to that of Knowshon Moreno from last year. He finished the year as the #5 RB in standard(non PPR) scoring format.